Nationals drew to a close today under continued blue skies and beautiful weather. The teams finished off CP, 2-way FS and 8-way today. The Dubai team performed a spectacular demo swoop over the pond, before calling it a day. Cornelia Mihai scooped up first place in all the CP events setting new world records for female distance and female speed. It is a disservice to this elite competitor to speak of her in the context of gender; She outswoops, outscores and outperforms male and female competitors across the globe and her climb to the top of the international Canopy Piloting scene is quite unbelievable. Dubai's Patrick Kaye and Billy Sharman and Belgium's Roy Seber took second and third places in the various CP events. Check out the full South African CP results here.

Non-South Africans can compete in SA Nationals but cannot medal so the CP was divided into 2 competitions; one including guest entries and the South African Nationals (the selection event for South African representation at the World Championship). In the SA Nationals, the overall and Speed winner was Jean Jacques Wallis, with Dian Kemp 2nd in both events and Waldo Prinsloo taking 3rd place in all except Accuracy. Rob Kruger took gold in Accuracy, despite not finishing the competition due to an ankle injury. In Distance, Dian took 1st place and Jean Jacques 2nd place. Full local CP results are listed below.

SAVOLO once again took Gold in the 4-way Formation Skydiving, with one change in the line-up from last year. We are excited to see their performance at the World Championships in Czech Republic later this year.

Thanks to Peter Lawson and the Pretoria Skydiving Club for once again hosting a smooth, professional and infinitely pleasant South African Nationals.

CP started today and Team Dubai's Cornelia Mihai has been doing some cleaning up, leading the competition in Distance, Accuracy and Overall. This Romanian lady is such an inspiration. She only entered her 1st canopy piloting competition in November 2011 and proves that this predominantly male event need not be.

Having the full-time, professional swoopers from Dubai here has upped the ante and made a really spectacular event. They have already broken world records - and convincingly! - but due to some administrative technicalities unrelated to their performances, they might not be able to register them. What a treat to see them at work.

Rob Kruger, South African canopy Pilot and host drop zone local, sadly injured himself today, taking himself out of the competition. We're glad both Rob and Chris Teague are OK and have nothing too serious but we're disappointed to see 2 of our strongest pilots out of the meet.

On the FS front, the 4-way Open teams have worked through some technical rounds today and will be finished tomorrow morning. SAVOLO is strongly in the lead with no threats to their position, despite being some rounds behind. Jazz Republic - with a new line-up - is currently in 2nd place and VX4 have returned with 1 new member from their 2012 line-up and is currently in 3rd position.

Nationals newcomers, Wing It have now cleaned up the FS 2-way Novice, followed by Tumbles in 2nd and Kung Fools taking 3rd place. FS 4-way Novice team, Random Motion, have shown some nice scores as their meet progressed and completed competition today. It's great to see these competitors coming up through the ranks and we hope the competition bug has bitten hard ebough to bring them back again next year.

Tomorrow: More swoop, 8-way and 4-way Intermediate.

2014-04-28

Formation Skydiving is off to a roaring start, with 4-way teams having completed between 4 and 6 rounds by the end of day 1. Wing It and Tumbles are having a close competition in the Novice 2-way which saw 3 of the 4 teams posting the same high-score on round 3.

The 2-way Open and 4-way Intermediate teams largely include 4-way Open competitors, so only 1 team has started jumping and the others should start to catch up tomorrow.

CP competition officially begins tomorrow (Tuesday). South Africa is really disappointed that our local champion, Chris Teague is out of the compeition with an ankle injury. We're glad to see him walking around just days after surgery, but airborn with the rest of our team, pitted against a strong team of elite, international swoopers would certainly be better. The Canopy Piloting is set to be a fantastic show, starting at 8am tomorrow morning.

2014-04-27

The official training days for the Formation Skydiving events are over and most teams have arrived and are ready for action. CP is only scheduled to start on Tuesday so the CP competitors will still have some time to arrive and train on Monday. We have visiting competitors from Dubai and Belgium and everyone is after high scores at the high altitude course.

The draws are done and the drop zone was alive with teams prepping for the first rounds.